Friends,

We put a lot of effort into air tightness design, detailing, and construction administration, often including 6-sided mockup and parital or whole-building blower-door testing.  For commercial buildings, these tests measure air leakage in cfm/sf at 1.57 psf (75pa).  

I came across this research paper several years ago, but... Read more

We've been doing some work gathering actual energy data on our recent projects. (In January we actually issued a report on 21 public buildings ). 

One of the biggest issues is getting access to the actual data - many clients don't want to share. 

Has anyone crafted proposal or contract language allowing/requiring design team... Read more

Do you have the authority to start using only EVs in your renderings?  Let’s normalize and accelerate this change!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_production_battery_electric_vehicles

Why are we showing gas cars in renderings of our green buildings?

Standard HVAC systems require large fans and ductwork to move conditioned air throughout a building, which wastes energy and building space.

BuildingGreen-Approved Chilled Beams

BuildingGreen lists chilled beams that rely on water and smaller ducts to provide HVAC throughout a building.

Performance and Health Considerations... Read more

Welcome to the quiz portion of Choosing Insulation: Health and Environmental Considerations – Unit 1.

Learning Objectives
Upon completing this course, participants will be able to:


 

1. Discuss how insulation works.
2. Summarize how insulation performance is measured and reported.
3. Recount the wide... Read more

Add member info for accrediting organizations See past CEUs (article/course/webcast name, quiz results) Download certificates Finish incomplete quizzes

Anne Hicks Harney, FAIA, has more than 30 years of experience, focusing on high-quality design imbued with a solid technical and sustainable foundation. At Long Green Specs, she provides sustainability-focused construction specifications and building material expertise to architectural firms across the country. She was chair of the AIA... Read more

Hurricane Tests Resilient Design—and Family Dynamics

A building project brings brothers back together, but a fast-moving storm challenges the project and the family.
Of storms & chins »

New Occupational Hazard Threatens Unshod Office Workers

Whistleblowers alert state health agencies to possible foot fungus scourge... Read more

The Sustainable Design Leaders group has had awesome, inspiring Summits for ten years now—and there is so much more we can do can to make it a thriving, essential year-round community. To do that we have to extend the trusted “safe space” of the Summits into our online conversations.

And other groups are just getting started on a... Read more

Hi Gurus, given these crazy times and many good people being laid off - I'm hoping this is coming at a good time! Hope you are all safe and healthy! It's also flexible so if you are a parent of young child(ren) - also a good 'pandemic job' - sad that that's a "thing" now!

Job description: Project Manager for Green Building Startup

... Read more

Hi everyone -
Some of you already have heard some or all of this news, but I thought I'd share today's press release with the whole group.
The headline is: 
SERA is VERY excited to announce that David Johnson, formerly the managing partner of Bill McDonough's San Francisco office, is now heading up SERA's bay area office.... Read more

Hi All!

One of our project teams is looking for some references for solar panel installation around Silver Spring, MD / DC area. Does anyone have recommendations or references for commercial installers of solar panel systems? Feel free to email me directly!

Thanks, 

Yarden

Team,

As you all probably saw, Boston is discussing using both CEI (carbon emission intensity) and EUI as basic scope of work.  Maybe the more surprising thing is China announced a new building code next year to include carbon emission analysis as a basic scope of work for all buildings.   New buildings in 2022, among other things,... Read more

Hi folks,

We've arranged a room where we can gather for an hour and check in during the Thursday afternoon reception time at Living Future. If you'll be there, come join us!

Thursday, May 2 at 5:30, Skykomish Room (#604, 6th floor)

The group will be mostly Sustainable Design Leaders, as that's by far our largest group, but... Read more

Green Gurus –

Clark Brockman brought to our attention an important and impactful opportunity to advance building decarbonization through the US Department of Energy’s proposed rulemaking around water heater efficiency, advancing adoption of heat pumps, while still providing exceptions (and efficiency targets) for electric or natural gas... Read more

As I prepare to search for summer interns, I'm wondering what colleges and universities have programs for sustainability in the built environment. Are there any that you all know of? I am trying to find alternatives to the traditional architecture programs that we track. Thanks